


After the Ascension

by AliceLost



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Microfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-28
Updated: 2020-03-28
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:08:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23355964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AliceLost/pseuds/AliceLost
Summary: A brief fic about a slice of life after the Mayor's successful ascension.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	After the Ascension

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kanra](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kanra/gifts).



The wind whipped through the vampire's hair as he sprinted through the graveyard, pursued by the Slayer hot on his heels. He slowed for a moment as he reached a wall, preparing to leap it when she caught him, hands on the back of his jacket and flinging him backwards into a tombstone. 

“Slayer!” He threw himself at her with a snarl and ricocheted off her boot as she kicked him solidly in the face. 

“The one and only.” Faith drew the stake from inside her jacket and lunged, blocking the vamp's wild swings as she knocked him to the ground. She dropped to her knees on top of him and started to plunge her stake down when a blow caught her on the back of the head, knocking her momentarily senseless. The vamp beneath her caught her wrists and levered her off him as the second swung again, sending her cartwheeling across the ground. 

She rolled back up onto her feet and pivoted, lashing out with her feet to keep them at distance, but as she caught one the other slipped past her and grappled her to the grass. He lowered his eager fangs towards her, then recoiled as she surged upwards with a savage headbutt. As he reeled backwards, she pushed him hard enough to free her wrist and stabbed the stake deep into his heart. With a shocked expression he crumbled to dust just as the second vamp snapped a quick kick at her hand, sending the stake flying and Faith scrabbling backwards across the ground. The vampire stepped over her, fangs bared and a triumphant expression leering down through yellow eyes. The next moment there was nothing. A single flailing limb was carried upwards on a tide of crunching bone and rending flesh, jerking helplessly before being crushed between powerful mandibles. 

Faith pulled herself to her feet in the shadow of the enormous demon that towered above her. “Gee boss, you couldn't have done that a little sooner? He almost got to chowing down on me.”

Gargantuan Olvikan looked down at her with the closest thing that passed for a paternal look on the demon snake's face. His voice was a rumbling blend of echoing demon tongue and the Mayor's old, chipper tone. “Well Faith, just because I'm a hundred tons of pure blooded demon now doesn't mean you aren't still going to have to fight your own fights. I'm not going to spoil an independent young woman like yourself by winning all of her battles for her.”

She frowned at him. “Thanks, I'm sure I'll learn a lot of life lessons from being dead and all. I think I liked it better when you had the vamps in this town working for you. This whole Slayer phase was something I kinda outgrew.”

The earth shuddered as he dropped his head down beside her, still twice her height lying flat. “Yes well it's a new era for this little town of ours, and I want you to be a part of that.” He slithered forward, crushing headstones to dust as his bulk pressed over them. “Sunnydale's spent a hundred years as a feeding ground for all kinds of monsters and demons, people huddled away in their houses not even knowing what they're afraid of. That's all changed now. The only demon eating people around here from this point forward,” he paused as they reached the cemetery entrance to let her go first, “will be me.” 

They moved down the street together, Faith on the sidewalk and Olvikan taking up the road. Sunnydale no longer permitted any kind of street parking, and so the roads were all clear enough for him to travel down unhindered. Everything was scrupulously clean except for the occasional spot where he had crushed something in his passing that had not yet been tidied away.

“This is your success as well as mine, Faith, but we have to work to maintain it. I founded this town on a hellmouth for a reason, and it does tend to attract a certain unsavoury element. I need my Slayer to deal with any undesirable characters who happen by, such as-” His lilting rumble ground to a halt as his demonic senses caught sight of something ahead. He reared upwards like a cobra several stories tall, peering over treetops to get a better perspective, before lunging forward with incredible speed. 

A couple of blocks away a young man walking home turned with petrified eyes at the sound of Olvikan bearing down on him. He dropped to his knees with a wail and prostrated himself to the ground as the street around him filled with demonic snake. Olivikan lowered himself slowly down until his maw was mere feet away from the man.

“Come on young fellow, get up, no need to grovel. Although it is appreciated.” He twitched one of his mandibles back down the way they had both come. “I just wanted to bring to your attention a small matter that I believe escaped your notice.” The man looked up at the gaping array of giant teeth in front of him, then over his shoulder at the sidewalk behind him. A single empty candy bar wrapper rolled lazily away from a pristine trash can in the gentle breeze.

“I'm so sorry!” He paled an unhealthy shade of white. “I thought I threw that out properly, I swear. I would never litter, never!” He swallowed hard as Olvikan's serpentine breath washed over him.

“Yes, well, when it comes to cleanliness it always behooves you to check twice. You have a civic responsibility, young man, and we wouldn't want to let our standards slip now would we, or what example would we be setting for the next generation?” The Mayor's cheerful cadence was interspersed with baritone hissing and short, snapping clicks. The man in front of him positively vibrated from nodding in enthusiastic agreement. “Now, pick that up and then run along will you? I'd just do it myself, but...no hands.” His jaw unhinged and his saber-like teeth pulled back in a ghastly imitation of a grin as he let out a grating, sibilant chuckle.

The young man sprinted forward, snatching the wrapper from the ground and shoving it thoroughly down into the open trash can before starting to run in the opposite direction. “Yes Sir, thank you Sir, I promise it won't happen again, Sir,” he shouted as he ran.

Faith sauntered up next to him as they watched the retreating figure. “Do you ever get stressed out, being so wicked into keeping everything clean?”

“No.”

Olvikan reared up again, examining the street around them, measuring angles with one eye shut. “Besides, I really couldn't pick it up myself, not without tearing up the whole road! It's exhilarating, seeing the world from such a new perspective, having the very scale of my existence redefined. And of course, making small adjustments like getting used to not having arms. It really forces you to approach things differently.” 

He suddenly dashed forward again, lashing out blindingly quick with his spiked club of a tail, sweeping the fleeing young man off his feet with a wet, meaty thunk. The body soared briefly above the top of the buildings then arced back down and collapsed limply in the open trash can, accompanied by the sound of snapping bone and cartilage. Olvikan dislocated his jaw again in another demonically pleased expression.

“But hey, look at that. Still got the ol' golf swing down. Hole in one!”

Faith looked up at him with a worried expression.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

“I still have so much to do.” Buffy shook her head at the pile of clean linen stacked in front of her. The sun streamed in on the crisp new sheets she had just affixed to her bed, but there were still so many things that needed to be put away.

“Yeah, got to get ready. Little sis coming.” Faith stood beside her, straightening the last corner of the bedsheet. She looked beautiful, not dressed in anything Buffy had seen her in before but a cute pink summer dress and light, radiant blush and lipstick. She looked like somebody's daughter. 

“That's not what I meant.” Buffy stopped, frowning in concentration. There were other things she had to do, she knew that. She just needed to remember what they all were.

“I know.” Faith leaned in, brushing strands of hair from Buffy's face. Her fingers felt warm, Buffy's cheek unusually cold. 

“There's just, an order to things. I have to do them all right.” She shook her head. “I should have made a list.”

“You don't need that.” Faith smiled softly at her and kissed her gently on the forehead. Warmth radiated out from where her lips had touched the skin. “You've always done things your own way. You make it work.”

Buffy looked at her with the same frown of concentration, trying to remember things that felt like they were on the tip of her tongue. “It didn't with you.” It was half a statement, half a question. Faith shrugged.

“I wasn't ready then. You've got to give these things time. Rome wasn't built in a day.”

“But are you ready now?” She glanced down at the bedsheet. It had been fresh and clean a moment ago, but already crimson droplets were starting to fall and stain it. “How will I know?”

The response was a tender smile. “You just need to have faith.” The younger Slayer wrapped her hand around Buffy's head and pulled her into a kiss, slow but passionate. Warmth seemed to surge through her body at the touch.

In the hallway, the bald, bespectacled head of a man poked around the corner, opening his mouth to speak before taking in the two Slayers' embrace and quietly retreating back out of the doorway. After a moment, Buffy came up for air and Faith was already smiling conspiratorially at her.

“So, you ready for me to take this thing out yet?” Faith gestured down, and Buffy looked to see the knife Faith held in her hand, embedded to the hilt in Buffy's side. She glanced back up and then felt her eyes widen in shock as Faith sharply withdrew it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

In a darkened room, on a bed sparsely surrounded by medical equipment, Buffy opened her eyes with a gasp.


End file.
